Ever Heard of Compatibility?
by Doppleganger Tango
Summary: "Kurt, are you listening to me? I want to get a dog." This time Kurt did look up, because Blaine Anderson's voice sounded not just clear, but confident. "I heard you; I just thought it was the medication talking."  Unrepentant fluff, beware.


_Takes place after **Trust** in the **EHo** verse. _**  
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**Ever Heard of Compatibility?**

"I want to get a dog." Kurt Hummel didn't even look up from where he was making dinner when his fiancé made that statement, simply nodded and kept stirring. If he left the sauce on the heat too long, it would be ruined. He might not be the best cook, but what he cooked well, he cooked very well.

"Kurt, are you listening to me? I want to get a dog." This time Kurt did look up, because Blaine Anderson's voice sounded not just clear, but confident.

"I heard you; I just thought it was the drugs talking."

Blaine rolled his eyes, shifting uncomfortably in the wooden chair he had perched himself in to watch Kurt make dinner. He hated not being able (allowed) to help. He hated that he still had another few weeks wearing his casts. He hated that he was so drugged up he had to sleep on the couch because he couldn't make it up the stairs. He hated that Kurt refused to sleep in their bed alone and had bought a blow up mattress and slept on the floor next to him.

Well, he only kind of hated that part.

"I'm stuck at home while you go to work every day and I'm lonely." With a smile, trying to cover the frown that was threatening to overtake his features like always, Kurt turned back to the stove to remove the sauce from the heat, still stirring lightly.

"I know that you hate being stuck here, and I hate it too, but you have to rest up. You'll be back to normal in no time."

Blaine winced as he pulled himself from his perch in the dining area, hobbling over to Kurt as quietly as the cast on his leg would allow. It wasn't nearly quiet enough, causing Kurt to turn around and rush forward, wrapping an arm around Blaine's waist and holding him still.

"The doctor said-" Blaine shook his head and pulled back, wincing at the strain in his shoulder and side and leg and... really, was there a body part that didn't hurt?

"I was in a car accident Kurt, I'm not dying." Blaine knew he'd said the wrong thing as he felt Kurt stiffen against him, however he didn't pull away. He couldn't, Blaine could barely stand on his own right now.

"I'm sorry. I know how worried you were, how worried you still are, but I'm fine. So I need help walking to the bathroom or to the kitchen and I have to make sure not to sleep on one side on the couch too long because it hurts more, but I'm fine. I'm alive and in a few weeks I'll be back to normal."

Kurt didn't want to fight with Blaine, poor drugged up Blaine who hadn't felt normal since the accident, so instead he checked the stove once more before hobbling with his boyfriend into the other room. Blaine had to switch sides while sleeping, but he was able to sit up now with little trouble. There was a cast on his left leg, covering his ankle up to his shin, plus the one on his arm. He didn't have to wear the neck brace, although the doctor's told him to wear it longer than he had. Besides the bumps and bruises and cuts, he also had a cut on his forehead that they had to shave his head to be able to stitch.

The only good thing to come out of the accident was, since it wasn't Blaine's fault, he would be able to talk to a lawyer and get a settlement. It didn't really even out though, no amount of money would make what happened better. It would never give Blaine these weeks back.

"In a few weeks, I'll be able to go back to work, but what about until then Kurt? I'm locked in this house, day after day, with nothing but crappy daytime television to keep me company. Soap operas, which I've become addicted to, talk shows, Maury! I need something to do."

Once he was sure that Blaine was perched in the nest they had made him, made of the most comfortable pillows and blankets in the house, Kurt sat beside him and grabbed his uninjured hand, squeezing it between both of his own.

"I know, but Blaine, a dog is a lot of work. It needs to be walked and taken outside." Blaine sighed, twisting his body so that he could lean against his boyfriend, trying not to show his frustrations. He had been doing so well with keeping them all in this whole time.

"I know how much work a dog is Kurt, if you'll remember, I was the sole caretaker of my dog in high school. We talk about looking into adoption once we're married and you won't even get me a dog? It's got to be easier than the plant." The last bit was said teasingly, since that had been the running joke with their families when they announced their engagement.

"First off, I didn't kill the plant, it committed suicide. Secondly, I didn't say we wouldn't get a dog. I just don't think we should get one when you need help to get from the couch to the bathroom. Let's give it a couple more weeks and then we will talk about it again?"

Blaine didn't hesitated, turning his head to capture Kurt's lips in a quick kiss, before telling him to go check on dinner. Of course Kurt didn't have to be told twice, wary of burning one of his favorite meals (again). Not that Blaine really wanted to wait a few weeks, although he definitely understood where Kurt was coming from and had every intention of waiting.

It had been just about a week and a half later when Blaine first spotted him. He was on the back porch, finally able to move a bit on his own now, although it took him twenty minutes to get from one end of the house to the other. It was still cold out, although spring would be coming soon, even if it felt colder at night now than it had during the snowy part of winter. The back porch was protected by an overhang, but it was wet from the rain the night before and Blaine honestly shouldn't have been outside. He should have been inside, curled up on the couch watching a recording of a soap opera and yelling at the television, because that's what he did. Instead he was on the porch, admiring their empty backyard, when he spotted a scraggly looking creature squirming underneath the fence.

Blaine kept very still, eyes trained on the thing as it pulled itself under the fence. It was some odd mixture of gray and brown, although the brown might have been mud, fur sticking out at odd angles. The tail was tucked between its legs, but it was very obviously a dog. A malnourished, homeless dog.

Blaine didn't move as it made its way to the trash can that they kept out back, standing on its back legs to push the top off, rummaging through what it could get to. He briefly remembered a strange conversation with Kurt a few nights ago about how one of them kept forgetting to put the lid back on the trash can and it was just inviting trouble. It hadn't turned into an argument, since Kurt honestly couldn't say it wasn't him that was doing it as well, so Blaine didn't mind. But the knowledge that this dog had been breaking into their trash cans for a few nights to find food... that he did mind.

He moved slowly, his only speed at the moment, towards the back door which was open, although not completely. The dog had spotted him by that time, crouching down but not running off. Blaine knew the dangers of feeding a stray, knew that the dog would probably come back often and may even bring friends, but he couldn't help it. It went against his nature to let someone (or something) suffer.

Sneaking back out, slowly and as quietly as possible, he lowered himself onto the edge of the porch and dropped the scraps from his lunch onto the ground a few feet away. The dog seemed hesitant, scooting over to get a closer look but refusing to drop his eyes, watching Blaine in case he decided to try something.

The lure of the food seemed to be too much for the poor creature that finally dropped its eyes just long enough to snatch up the food and step back a few feet before eating it. Blaine bent his head at a slightly awkward angle, craning his neck a bit, to figure out the sex of the dog.

"Where'd you come from boy?" The dog snapped his head up at the words, scaring down the last bit of food before running back to the gate, tail tucked between his legs, and slithering underneath it the way he had come.

Blaine made it a habit after that to sneak outside about the same time every day and leave some food, ranging anywhere from right at the porch to where the trash can sat almost ten feet away. The dog didn't come every day, but always came alone, never stayed long. Sometimes Blaine spoke to him, noticing that after the first few days, the dog stopped running away at the sound of his voice.

A week after Blaine found the dog, a rare day when Kurt didn't have to go into work on a weekday, Blaine made the decision to introduce the dog to Kurt. It didn't go exactly as planned, but things with Kurt rarely did. It was part of why Blaine loved Kurt so much.

While Blaine expected Kurt to frown at the creature, maybe comment on his scraggly appearance or the fact that Blaine wanted to adopt a stray instead of going to a shelter, he was surprised when Kurt made an odd cooing sound and bent down to the mutt.

"He looks so pitiful, how could I deny that face? Besides, with a bath or two... or three... he may even look brand new." It took the two of them the better part of an hour the next time the dog came back to the house to lead the dog inside, another twenty minutes to get him upstairs where the bath tub was.

By the time they got the dog as clean as they could (three rinses of the dog shampoo and two of a dog conditioner that Blaine had rolled his eyes at), Blaine could honestly say that the dog didn't look half as bad as he thought. Still very clearly underfed, but not unfortunate looking. It was still completely impossible to discern the breed of the dog, but that wasn't too important.

They posted flyers, a picture included of the before and after shot, as well as called various pet stores and vets in the area to see if someone was missing a dog, but no one claimed him. The dog slept either on the couch at Blaine's feet or next to him, standing up to pace a few times in the night, but always nosing at Blaine's hand or foot before going back to sleep. After taking the dog to the vet to get his shots, naming him Dalton in a fit of humor, it became quite obvious that the dog was their's to keep.

While the doctor gave Blaine his restrictions, to take it easy and no rough housing with the dog (or vigorous sex with Kurt, although the doctor did blushingly say that slow and gentle was okay), he also approved him to take the stairs. This was good, because Blaine really didn't want to have slow and gentle sex on the couch.

That was usually for their quick sex before they both had somewhere to be.

When Blaine woke up to a strange noise, his first thought was that his dreams were getting out of hand now that he was weaned off of the pain killers. His second was that maybe Kurt was having problems in his closet. But a look told him that he wasn't dreaming nor was Kurt near his closet. In fact, Kurt was curled up against Blaine, still completely asleep.

The noise came again and this time Blaine new exactly what it was that made it. Kurt was startled awake as Blaine shot out of bed, hobbling a bit without the familiar weight of his cast, before moving to the bedroom door, pressing his ear against it?

"What's going on?" Kurt reached to turn on the light but Blaine made an abortive gesture, turning the knob as quietly as possible. The floorboards in the house didn't creak but the doors did.

"Call 911, I think we have an intruder."

It probably spoke measures about the fact that Blaine wasn't worried about what the burglar could steal. Most everything in the house could be replaced, and the things that couldn't weren't worth confronting someone with such little regard for the law. He wasn't even that worried that the burglar would come upstairs and hurt Blaine or Kurt, although there was a bit of him that was. While they didn't have a gun in the house, Blaine had studied boxing and certain types of martial arts. He might be rusty, and recovering from serious injuries, but he knew he could hold his own. Unless the intruder was armed.

No, what Blaine was worried about was Dalton, who had taken to sleeping curled up on the bathroom floor because it was warmest in there. Listening to Kurt behind him mumble into the phone their information, telling the operator to hurry, Blaine opened the door as quietly as he could.

There was more than one voice coming from downstairs, talking about televisions and wires. Blaine tiptoed to the bathroom, stopping when he noticed that it was empty. Dalton never left the bathroom until the morning when he'd scratch on the bedroom door to go outside. He had a food and water bowl in there as well as his bedding, so he shouldn't need to go anywhere, but...

A series of loud growls and barks, as well as a scream of surprise coming from downstairs, made Blaine twirl around. Kurt met him at the top of the stairs, holding on to Blaine's arm as he tried to go down them.

"They might be armed!" Blaine pulled his arm back, kissed the corner of Kurt's mouth, and started down the stairs, keeping to the side so that he wouldn't be seen. Dalton was growling at the foot of the stairs, facing into the living room. One of the guys was trying to calm him, mumbling something about "nice doggy", while the other ones seemed to be trying to figure out if they should make a break for the back door or not.

It didn't matter, because there suddenly was flashing blue lights coming through the front windows, a series of very colorful curses coming from the intruders, before a cop walked through the semi-opened door with his gun drawn.

Kurt joined Blaine on the stairs, wrapping his arms tightly around his waist and waiting until the cops had taken the guys out of the house before they descended. Dalton had stopped growling, sitting quietly at the bottom of the stairs with his tail wagging lightly. The cops asked a few questions, wrote everything for the report, before telling them that they were lucky and leaving.

They surveyed the damage, their television having been pulled off its mount and various other things thrown about carelessly, before locking the door and sitting on the couch, Dalton nestled between their legs somehow.

"That was terrifying. Especially the part when you apparently wanted to play crime stopper." Blaine did something between a laugh and sigh before pressing his forehead to Kurt's shoulder.

"It wasn't like that; I just wanted to get Dalton upstairs." Kurt sighed, wrapping his arm around Blaine while tangling his other hand into Dalton's fur.

"As much as I like this dog, especially after tonight, if it's between you or Dalton, I'm going to pick you. Every time. There are thousands of other dogs. There is only one you." Blaine nodded, realizing just how stupid his actions had been. So soon after his accident too. He felt a little like he'd been tempting fate.

"Okay, now our choice is either to sit down here and relive that not so pleasant experience or go upstairs and try to get some sleep, deal with the damage in the morning. What do you say?" Kurt nodded, releasing Dalton's fur but giving him a loving pet before standing up.

They were halfway up the stairs when Blaine turned around, patting his leg and calling for the dog to follow them. Kurt thought that Blaine was leading him back into the bathroom, but when they passed it and Dalton followed them into the bedroom, he raised an eyebrow. He might have appreciated the dog for doing what he did, but there was absolutely no way that dog was sleeping in their bed with them. Maybe the floor, but definitely not the bed.

"Blaine." His voice didn't come out half as warning as it should have, but it was hard to do as Blaine _and _Dalton jumped into the bed, Blaine curling up on his side facing where Kurt should be laying, Dalton curling up on the foot of the bed, his tail wagging just the slightest bit.

"Come on Kurt. Just for tonight?"

Kurt sighed, unable to deny both sets of puppy eyes at once. He knew he was going to regret giving in, but he was unable to care just yet. Curling up beside Blaine, they shared their second goodnight kiss, both mumbling a goodnight to the dog that was already asleep near their feat, and drifted off to sleep themselves.

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><p><strong>AN: **I'm so sorry it's been so long since I've updated anything. I promise, I'm working on No Man's Land as well as another Genie one shot. There is only one more story left in the EHo verse that I've planned as well, so there's that to look forward to.

I hope you enjoyed this story. I have been in the need of some serious fluff with all the angst in my own life, so this came out. And Dalton is completely inspire by what I imagine my dog's puppies would be like, only larger. (Father is Jack Russell Terrier/Chihuahua, mother is Poodle. It'll be an interesting mix.)


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